14-year-old Missouri girl shoots elk 200 miles from herd

HALLSVILLE, Mo. – A 14-year-old Missouri girl who thought she was shooting a large white-tailed buck instead took down an elk.

Missouri conservation agent Tom Strother says the girl was hunting with her dad Saturday when she took the shot. When her dad realized the animal was an elk, he called a conservation agent.

Missouri currently has no hunting season for elk. A herd is being grown in southeast Missouri after elk were reintroduced at Peck Ranch Conservation Area in 2011.

The Springfield NewsLeader reports that Abby Wilson took the elk down with one shot from her rifle. She called her dad who was hunting nearby who alerted the Missouri Department of Conservation.The teen’s father, Donald White, wrote FOX 2 about the incident. He referenced this Facebook post:

“It’s not every day here in Boone County that you hunt all year for horns, and my goodness you see horns. Abby Wilson made one heck of a shot. To get to your stand, and hear the stand shaking, and see the smile on your face, and for me to ask, ‘where is he?’

The shock of what I saw. When I asked the Conservation agent, ‘Hey, do you have elk in Boone County?’ His reply was no. Yes sir, you do.

Send me a pic he said. Within one hour they showed up in disbelief. The look on their face was priceless.”

Strother says the elk shot Saturday was 200 miles away from the Peck Ranch herd, between Hallsville and Centralia.

The carcass is undergoing several tests, to see if it’s diseased or to get clues where it came from.